GRANDFATHER MOUNTAIN, N.C. – It's always good to take a break from the madding crowd, but especially now that American politics has surpassed itself in self-mockery.
After four days avoiding TV, blogs, YouTube and cell phones, it is possible to wonder how we get so exercised about the insignificant. Not that politics isn't important. The debate about the role government plays in our lives is no small thing.
And while we can't all kick back and hope our enemies work out their issues, a little perspective is salutary and productive.
Some made fun of Barack Obama recently when he spoke of needing "think time." He was chatting with Britain's Conservative Party leader, David Cameron, who asked Obama if he ever gets a vacation. Obama replied that he planned to take a week in August and said the most important thing for a leader "is to have big chunks of time during the day when all you're doing is thinking."
Why that was considered risible, I don't know. When I teach writing, I tell students to make time for nothingness. Great ideas don't materialize on command, but usually come unbidden when we let the mind roam. That's what Obama surely meant, and he is right. Perhaps Nancy Pelosi was right, too, when, after Democrats voted themselves a five-week recess, she turned off the lights, microphones and cameras. It's great theater to imagine Republicans orating in a dark echo chamber.
One could argue that Democrats are shirking their duty by adjourning amid an energy crisis. But isn't it possible that taking a break might prove productive?
I am sitting on the porch with my friend, Sally Hughes Smith – wife, mother, artist and author. We're talking about family, love, death – things that really matter to everyone.
Sally recently wrote "The Circle" (Medical University of South Carolina Center on Aging, $20, 108 pages) in which she chronicled her family's journey in helping her mother, now 96, move from the family home to a residential-care facility.
The book was Sally's private journal, but friends and family persuaded her to publish it. She teamed up with the center (www.musc.edu/aging/circle.htm) and is donating all proceeds to its research.
Anyone entering the world of Alzheimer's disease and dementia would find inspiration in Sally's diary. The message is: "We're all on the same journey. You can choose to do it with joy," says Sally.
Sally's story is everybody's and the revelations she experienced are universal. Here's the big one. As she packed up her childhood home and bid farewell to sights, smells and sounds she treasured, Sally realized that it wasn't about the house.
"It was about the relationships I was inheriting."
Family, in other words. It's what gives life meaning, makes our nation strong and keeps government working for us and not the other way around. Our political choices should be made in service of that understanding.
Reach Kathleen Parker at kparker@kparker.com.
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